TGIF – The Ungodly Truth

As the week winds down, we wind down with some tidbits for your information, education, health, and enjoyment.

Quote of the Week: “Man was made at the end of the week’s work when God was tired.”  Mark Twain  “This is even more apparent in an election year.”  Me

Humor Break:

Bev: Al, do you believe God made us in his own image?

Al: I hope not.

Stat of the Week: 6 studies.  Oh God I don’t believe what I am reading.  Oh God I don’t believe what I am writing.  Oh God, just when I thought we were veering toward a more diversity friendly world I discover the one thing all religions can agree on.  They don’t trust Atheists.  “In a series of psychological experiments conducted in Vancouver, Canada, participants revealed that they considered atheists to be less trustworthy than a number of groups often considered to be outliers, including Muslims, gay men, and feminists.”  It appears people trust Atheists about as much as they trust rapists. RAPISTS?  How in Heaven’s name did those two groups get lumped together?  According to the study “The lack of trust in atheists may reflect people’s assumption that individuals tend to behave more ethically if they believe they are being monitored by a higher power….”  Monitored by a higher power?  That’s what we have the government for!  God help those poor atheists.

Action Tip: Being diversity friendly includes atheists.  If you know one, be nice.

Check It Out: I have just finished my first week in my first back-to-(Online)-university course at Coursera.  The professor is from Princeton.  The students are from around the world.  First week was easy by volume, college level in difficulty.  There were two 1-hour lectures to watch.  They are posted on a Sunday night and remain available throughout the course.  There was also one chapter from our text assigned for reading.  That format will remain throughout the 12 weeks of the course.

What will be added are 9 Dialogue sessions featuring other Princeton professors and a few Princeton students.  Some of the discussions will center on issues sent in by those of us taking the class.  We will also be assigned six 750 word essays to be peer graded (clever how this is set up).  There will also be periodic self-graded quizzes.  As the optimist said to a group of folks on a third floor balcony as he fell from the top of a 20 story building “So far, so good!”  I am going to tell you some stories about some of my 70,000+ classmates on Wednesday.  They are interesting folks.

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.